The preoperative low-PNI was significantly associated with postoperative tumor recurrence (P<0.001), and but no other factors, including gender, age, preoperative leucocytes, albumin, carbohydrate antigen 19-9 (CA19-9), preoperative drainage for jaundice, child-pugh grade, history of diabetes, neoadjuvant chemotherapy, intraoperative blood loss volume, blood transfusion, operative time, tumour size and differentiation, resection margin, lymph node metastasis, postoperative complications and postoperative hospital stay (Table 1). The gene discussed is ALB; the disease is diabetes mellitus.